Tag: traffic

#365daysofbiking Ring around

January 31st – I shoot around Walsall’s new ring road all the time, and it’s not a road system I like at all. The junctions are complex and often, badly thought out; it’s unfriendly for bikes and the signals are only just seeming integrated with each other after ten years of being fiddled with.

However, it does have it’s plus points. Sweeping over the hill and canal bridge from Place Road past the old Smiths Flour Mill and up towards the Magistrate’s court is a delight, which flows well on a bike if the traffic lights and drivers will allow.

It’s also rather beautiful.

Don’t be deceived though; despite the marking and seemingly wide cycle lane there, it’s shared use, full of obstacles and soon Peters out to nothing.

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#365daysofbiking Quiet and bright

 

December 20th – A late night at work finishing off, then the Christmas party. I crossed Rushall Square junction late in the evening.

As ever, the lights were lovely and there was hardly anyone on the road, which was a bonus.

Christmas is feeling closer now…

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#365daysofbiking No ifs, The Butts:

November 15th – Riding home again on a late one, I swung a shortcut through the area of North Walsall called The Butts. One of my favourite parts of town, I love the dense, busy terraced streets, frantic rooflines and the way it all looks so warm and homely at night. There are real architectural gems here, and also usually cats, wandering dogs, people taking the air.

Sadly I don’t come here as often as I perhaps should do, as the dense parking makes for many a close shave on a bike, but it’s so worth it fro the brisk, handsome urbanity.

#365daysofbiking Ooh matron:

November 14th – Coming home from work, late. Diving off the main drag onto the canal at the unfortunately named Black Cock Bridge, which takes it’s name from the adjacent pub, The Black Cock.

Subject of schoolboy humour for over a century or more, this steep, precarious canal crossing probably hasn’t got many years left in it’s current form. decidedly too steep for many vehicles, weak and narrow, it’ll be interesting to see what happens to The Black Cock Bridge in the long run, as the geography has changed so much since the bridge was built that and undebridge with an aqueduct would no be more suitable.

In the mean time, at night, it’s wonderfully photogenic.

#365daysofbiking The last obstacle”

November 8th – Returning from Birmingham that evening, the weather was still grim and I stopped to take a photo of the traffic at the Shire Oak crossroads.

Shire Oak Hill is like a homecoming to me. it’s the last obstacle to sanctuary before a gentle and lovely roll downhill into Brownhills. Light or dark, good weather or bad, cresting this hill is always and absolute joy.

At night, in rain, it’s also a fascinating collage of reflection, light and hard surfaces. It fascinates me. 

365daysofbiking I am traffic:

October 8th – A snatched photo on the way home in the dark. This is a normal commute at the normal kind of time and I’ll have to get used to this now. Rushall Square is always kind of beautiful at night. Even when traffic free, it appears busy with traffic signals, street and shop light mingling.

These commutes are the hardest of all, the first in unusual darkness. But their urban beauty is hard to ignore.

Ah well, down the hatch…

June 18th – for the second time in 12 months, Green Lane has been closed so sewage tankers can relive backed up sewers due to a pip collapse near the Clayhanger Sewage Works.

The road has been impassible to cars as drivers Marshall tankers in relays pumping out effluent and Marshall plant around.

Sadly, the impatience of some drivers was pretty unimpressive. These people have a job to do. Let them get on with it.

April 8th – I’ve been trying to get a decent version of this photo for ages. For two winters, in fact. What usually spoils it is traffic on the bridge and ripples on the surface of the canal. At Anchor Bridge tonight though, there were little of either when I flowed along here liquid back into Brownhills High Street – the reflection of the canal wasn’t bad and the Anchor’s lights looked welcoming and warm in the dark.

Sometimes, with some photos, its just a matter of patience.

April 4th – I’d had to call into Aldridge after working late and returned via Streets Corner. I noted that the old wall to the 60s shopping precinct on the corner had gone, and excavations were underway.

This is the preparatory work for the next stage of local junction improvements work which will see this entire junction remodelled with new signals, slip roads and crossings.

Peaceful now in the gathering dusk, but a summer of inconvenience and holdups for motorists seems to be on the cards…

Shire Oak has been massively improved, however, so it’ll be worth it in the end.